New Delhi: A group of around 40 Manufacturing Engineering students at the Cambridge University Institute for Manufacturing (IfM), will visit more than 20 of India’s leading firms, as a part of their summer study tour.

The trip will form part of a major research project called 'Hot Stuff – India’s recipe for Industrial Success'. It is hoped the research team will provide greater understanding of the investment opportunities for UK companies in India as well as identify future trends.

Prof Mike Gregory, Head of the IfM, said, "India is an incredibly exciting and important region; it is shaping up to play an increasingly leading role in the global economy."

The work will form part of a growing partnership in industrial innovation involving UK and Indian businesses and universities. The trip is just the latest in a series of such collaborations between the University of Cambridge and academic and business institutions in India.

Tour leader Dr Ajith Parlikad, Lecturer in Automation and Control in the IfM’s Distributed Information and Automation Laboratory, said, "We’ll be focusing on three core areas, sustainability and growth, looking at parallels between service industry and manufacturing and looking at whether India’s future is now in hi-tech sectors."

"This tour will help us to understand the challenges this will pose both internally and externally and produce some important lessons for UK manufacturing," added Prof Mike Gregory.

Student group leader Jonny Thompson said, "The rapid changes Indian industry is undergoing at the moment makes it an extremely exciting country for us to visit.

"We hope to be able to compare and contrast our experiences in the UK to those we find in India and draw useful conclusions on how these can be used to provide mutual benefits as well as informing further stages of growth in both the UK and India "

Research from the project will be published in a comprehensive written report and the findings will be presented at the IfM’s new Cambridge headquarters later this year.